Made in China: good or bad?

The beginning of the 90s was marked by the flow of various Chinese products, characterized by very low cost and nightmarish quality. It was then that a stable opinion was formed that everything produced in China was of poor quality and non—functional. But a lot has changed since that time.

Almost everything is produced in China

Part of the components for the recently introduced Mac Pro with the label "Made in USA" are still made in China

As for the quality, it all depends on the customer company: how much attention she pays to the results, how she monitors the quality, what requirements she puts forward. There is often a situation when products from different brands assembled at the same Chinese factory differ significantly in quality.

But China is not standing still, the country is developing rapidly. Workers are beginning to demand higher salaries, better working conditions. The cost of production is gradually increasing. And in comparison to this, production is gradually being pulled into less sophisticated countries, like Brazil or Vietnam.

More recently, Western companies and governments are beginning to be burdened by dependence on the Celestial Empire. Increasingly, there are calls for the return of production back to their homeland. So, Apple was proud to recently introduce the brand new Mac Pro with the label "Made in USA". But even for these computers, some of the components are still supplied from China.It is not easy to finally break such a connection, if not at all possible, even with the maximum support of the government.

When the brand is ours, and the assembly is Chinese

Smartphone Highscreen Thor with Full HD screen, 8-core processor and 2 GB of RAM

Another very popular direction today is that manufacturers limit themselves exclusively to maintaining the brand, entrusting the entire production process and development to Chinese assemblers. The Chinese will collect everything that you ask them, you can be of excellent quality and expensive, or you can be a little better than defective, but very cheap. You can order a variety of designs, choose technical specifications. As they say, any whim for your money. Here the customer himself decides what is preferable to him, what trends are present in his market.

And the results are sometimes very good. It turns out products that, thanks to a good ratio of cost, capabilities and quality, are highly popular with consumers. Typical representatives of such brands are Russian Highscreen and Ukrainian Globex. Globex smartphones and Highscreen, as well as tablets manufactured by them (Globex and Highscreen) are relatively inexpensive, but differ in good quality and characteristics. As a result, success among users aimed primarily at the low-cost segment.

Exclusively Chinese brands

Many of us actively use electronics manufactured by brands with native Chinese origin in our daily lives. It is noteworthy that the number of such brands is still low, but it is increasing almost every year.

Lenovo made a loud statement according to which its goal is absolute leadership in the smartphone market

The most famous example is the company Lenovo, existing since 1984. Initially, it was engaged in the supply of European and American computers to China, but soon switched to the production of this equipment on its own. The company made a significant breakthrough in 2005, when it bought out the computer division of the legendary IBM.

Today, many users are willing to buy laptops and Lenovo smartphones, completely ignoring their Chinese origin. Meanwhile, this company has made a loud statement, according to which its goal is absolute leadership in the smartphone market. And it should be noted that she has all the chances for this. The fact that Lenovo owns the legendary Motorola brand speaks volumes.

No less well-known and popular BBK products. Mainly thanks to tvs and DVD players. Again, these are very inexpensive products that can offer consumers normal functionality and high quality. After all, not everyone needs a Smart TV and screens with Full HD resolution.

There are also such companies whose products are widely distributed around the world, but are not yet familiar to ordinary consumers. A typical example is Huawei and ZTE, specializing in telecommunications equipment. They are also engaged in mobile devices, but in this matter they are significantly inferior in popularity to devices from the same Lenovo.

It would be appropriate to mention the company Tenda, specializing in inexpensive network equipment. Today, many users' apartments use Wi-Fi routers and routers from this manufacturer. The reason is the same — good performance at an affordable cost.

We have listed only a small part of the well-known Chinese manufacturers. In fact, their list is much wider. And they are playing an increasingly significant role on the world stage every day.

There is something to work on

Chinese manufacturers still have a lot of work to do. Moreover, the struggle will be not only for technology and quality, but also for the minds of consumers. So far, no Chinese brand causes users the same feelings as Sony or Apple. And it will be much more difficult to achieve this than high quality and wide functionality of products.

A fairly well-known manufacturer of Xiaomi smartphones is often deservedly reproached for constantly copying Apple's design. Even the head of the company himself admits this, referring to the fact that his engineers and designers simply do not have enough experience and knowledge yet. Apparently, the same applies to Chinese car manufacturers, whose cars sometimes look like they are assembled from parts of popular models from more well-known manufacturers.

They willingly adopt Western experience and technologies, hire highly qualified specialists. For example, the same Xiaomi is led today by Hugo Barra, a man who stood at the very origins of the Android operating system. So it is quite possible that in the foreseeable future there will be Chinese brands whose products will not be easy to be popular, but will also cause real delight, will acquire an army of devoted fans.